September finds the Royals still in the playoff hunt

September…The time for pennant races and roster expansion. With the Royals firmly having one foot in the former, they were ready to make moves on the latter. The team announced on Monday that they were reinstating right fielder Jac Caglianone from the injured list, recalling right-handed pitcher Luinder Avila and selecting the contract of catcher Carter Jensen.

Jensen opened the season in Double-A and hit .292/.360/.420 in 308 plate appearances for the Naturals. He hit six home runs, nine doubles and struck out in 23 percent of his plate appearances while walking 10 percent of the time. That performance earned a midseason bump to Omaha.

Since then? Absolute fire.

For the Storm Chasers, Jensen is hitting .288/.404/.647 in 184 PAs. That’s good for a wRC+ of 166, which means he’s been hitting 66 percent better than the average player in the International League. While Jensen has been regarded as a quality prospect, this bump in performance has been astounding. There’s the power: He’s hit 14 home runs and 11 doubles. There’s the plate discipline: He’s walking 16 percent of the time in Triple-A.

Even more impressive are his Statcast metrics. His average exit velocity in Triple-A has been 94 mph. His Hard-Hit rate is 59 percent. And Jensen is barreling the ball in eight percent of his plate appearances. Lordy, that’s some wild stuff.

I thought this dispatch, from Baseball America at The Futures Game back in July, was interesting:

Best batting practice: Carter Jensen

Jensen had one of the better Futures Game batting practices we’ve seen and led all players with 10 homers. Jensen was in control during each round, backspinning balls all over the field. In his final round, he decided to pocket the pullside power stroke, instead hitting lined shots up the middle of the field. Jensen commanded every round of BP and was the biggest standout from this year’s pregame work.

I’m on the record saying that, although Jensen’s performance certainly merited a call-up, I did not think the Royals would do that. At least not while they were in the Wild Card hunt. Jensen hasn’t caught this staff since spring training and there’s always going to be a bit of a learning curve for both pitcher and catcher. September in the thick of a pennant race doesn’t seem like the ideal time, but maybe I’m overthinking this. He will have a couple of quality tutors on hand in Salvador Perez and Luke Maile, along with the coaching staff of Brian Sweeney, Zack Bove and Mitch Stetter. There’s no shortage of experience or knowledge at Jensen’s disposal.

Of course, the coolest thing about Jensen getting the call is that the dude is a Kansas City kid. How cool is that? I’m well past prospect age myself, but I certainly remember going to games as a kid and thinking that it would be amazing to step foot on that field and walk through that dugout. Jensen is living the dream. Good for him. And good for us who can appreciate what he’s doing in his hometown. It’s going to be an insane week for Jensen and his family and friends. I cannot wait for his debut.

Caglianone rejoins the Royals hot off a rehabilitation assignment with the Storm Chasers as he recovers from a hamstring strain. Remember how he ripped through just two series for Omaha before he was promoted to the Royals in late June? Well, he set fire to the league once again. In 75 plate appearances since starting his rehab assignment back on August 12, Caglianone is hitting .385/.467/.692. That translates to a 200 wRC+. He’s walking nine percent of the time and is striking out in slightly under 15 percent of his plate appearances, which is incredibly encouraging. In the 16 games he’s played, Caglianone has gone hitless just four times. In three other games, he collected one hit. In the remaining 11 contests, he’s posted a multi-hit performance.

I thought at the time the injury was going to be a good opportunity for Caglianone to take a bit of a mental break from the grind of the majors and the rehab assignment would be a time to hit the proverbial reset button to get back into his groove. This is exactly what seems to have happened…with a vengeance.

This is a different Royals team from the one he made his debut with just a couple of months previously. So where does he fit in the lineup equation? I think he will resume playing in right field, which is where he again got most of his defensive reps in Omaha. They will likely have him at designated hitter on those days where Salvador Perez isn’t catching and the Royals are facing a right-handed starter. Mike Yastrzemski, who has been playing just some inspired baseball since arriving in Kansas City, isn’t going anywhere when a righty is on the mound. While Yaz has primarily been a right fielder in recent seasons, there’s no reason to think he can’t shift over to left if the Royals want Caglianone to get some time in the field.

The Royals have so many guys on this roster who can play multiple positions that there will always be a way to get Caglianone in the lineup or on the field.

While I was among those calling for Caglianone to get sent down prior to his injury, I’m just as excited to see how he does in his return. I’m reluctant to get too far ahead of myself here, but he could be a difference-maker in the middle of that lineup.

Avila has thrown exactly one major league inning this season, a key frame against the Washington Nationals back on August 13. The Royals lost that game, but Avila retired all three hitters he faced in the eighth inning. He looked poised and impressive.

He was sent back to Omaha shortly after that outing, but has struggled in his recent appearances, allowing eight runs in nine innings of work spread over four appearances. Yet, he’s struck out 10 batters over that time. Avila has a zippy fastball and a sharp curve that features some high spin and sharp downward break. He’s still a bit of a work in progress, but does feature some swing and miss stuff and could be an asset in the Royals bullpen down the stretch. At the very least, it’s an extra arm for Matt Quatraro and his staff at a time when the bullpen has been taxed.

A reminder that the rules for September roster additions changed a couple of years ago. No longer is it a free for all with players on the 40-man roster. Now, teams can only add two players (and only one of those two can be a pitcher), expanding the normal 26-man roster to 28 players. That’s a rare move from the baseball power brokers that I can get behind.

The Royals needed to add Jensen to their 40-man roster to get him to the big leagues, but that wasn’t an issue as they had only 38 players on said roster. Avila is the add on the pitching side, so that leaves the move to get Caglianone back on the roster. Jonathan India had missed the games on both Saturday and Sunday and it turns out he’s dealing with a sprained left wrist. He was placed on the IL, retroactive to August 30.

Trying to sort out how the Royals will field their lineup with all this movement is akin to attempting to solve a Rubik’s Cube while blindfolded. It can be done, but good luck. We know that Yastrzemski will lead off against right-handed starters, with Maikel Garcia having the honors versus lefites. Bobby Witt Jr. will hit second with Vinnie Pasquantino behind him. Salvador Perez will be either fifth or fourth, depending on where Garcia is batting. So the top five spots in the order are spoken for.

It’s the remaining four positions that provide the intrigue. Adam Frazier has played well since returning to Kansas City, but the same can be said about Michael Massey since his comeback from injury a week ago. Both are left-handed hitters and both will get time at second with India sidelined. There will also be opportunity there for both in left field. I discussed where Caglianone will fit in above.

Among the right-handed hitters on the roster, figure Randall Grichuk for starts against left-handed starters while Yaz sits. Nick Loftin can play anywhere. Tyler Tolbert should probably be relegated to pinch running opportunities at this point.

The bottom line is there are plenty of lineup permutations for Quatraro.

Since this is my first edition sent to your mailboxes in over a week, let’s take a look at the American League standings since the All-Star Break.

That’s eight teams between 24 and 22 wins. Two of the teams outside this window (Detroit and Houston) are both leading their divisions. This is such a weird game.

Now let’s look at the Wild Card standings:

A little over a week after the Royals left the Rangers for roadkill, somehow Texas has found their mojo. With an extra-inning win against the Diamondbacks on Monday, they’ve now won six in a row and jumped ahead of the Royals in the Wild Card race by a full game. I would say that neither team seems capable of catching the Mariners at this point, who remain three games ahead in the standings, but seriously…who the hell can predict how this is going to end.

I continue to maintain that the final Wild Card team will get to the tournament with 86 wins. With the Royals sitting at 70 wins, that means they’re going to need to finish off the regular season with a 16-9 run. That’s a .640 winning percentage, which seems a bit too large of an ask for this group. By my own admittedly rudimentary calculations, the Royals have had a couple of stretches of baseball where they went 16-9. One was the entire month of July and into August. Another was when they wrapped the homestand I chronicled last month by winning eight out of ten against the Nationals, White Sox and those Rangers. A bit of an overlap there, but it counts.

Let’s do some rough math. If 86 wins is the minimum to qualify, that would mean the Rangers have to go 14-9 or the Mariners need to finish at 13-11. Without getting too deep into schedules and strenght of remaining opponents and all that stuff (because I generally don’t think that matters so much), it looks like both the Rangers and Mariners will be playing more teams out of the hunt than in the playoff hunt down the stretch. If there’s an edge to be found, it’s probably just in the fact that the Mariners are currently ahead by a handful of games. They’re the team that controls their own destiny as they say.

While it’s fantastic that the Royals are playing meaningful baseball in September, and while I’ve been optimistic about their chances of hanging around in the race, I cannot shake the feeling that they’re just not good enough to snag that third spot. They’re better than Cleveland and they’ve shown they have the advantage over the Rangers. Maybe the Mariners continue to rediscover mediocrity. Maybe the Red Sox or Yankees hit a massive stumbling point. However this ends, I’m not sure the Royals can just get hot and sneak in. They’re going to need some help.

So about my extended hiatus…some personal stuff came up a couple of weeks ago and then I took off for a scheduled vacation the week before Labor Day. (If you don’t care, feel free to bail out here.) New York was the destination for a few days of sporting activities. On Tuesday, I caught the Phillies and the Mets at Citi Field. It was my first time visiting the spot where the Royals won the World Series 10 years ago. Overall, I enjoyed the park, but damn if they don’t play some sort of sounder after every single pitch. And there were a lot of pitches thrown on Tuesday. Also, the advertisements on the ribbon boards were, at times, completely obnoxious. Apparently, it was all about the cheese.

All in all it was a good time with the Mets walking it off in a 6-5 win over the Phillies.

The next two days, it was all about the tennis as I spent the day at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center taking in the US Open. It was my sixth time going and I swear, everytime I go the crowds grow exponentially from the previous visit. So do the prices.

Still, if you’re a fan of tennis, this is something you have to do at least once. My preference is to steer clear of Arthur Ashe Stadium and hang on the outer courts where you can get close to the action and watch some amazing doubles matches. I’ll also add that the people working this event, from the ushers to the souvenir stands to the food vendors, are some of the absolute best people in the world. Everyone I’ve ever encounted on the grounds of the US Open has been upbeat and positive and just happy to be there. It’s a tennis party.

We’ll get there when the gates open and generally stay until the last point is played on Louis Armstrong Stadium. It’s often around 12 hours of tennis action and it’s a total blast.

Every year, I take at least one good photo. This year it was Felix Auger-Aliassime blistering a serve somewhere around 130 mph.

With my tennis distraction out of the way, the focus returns entirely to baseball and the stretch run. The Royals have a shot. That’s what matters at this point.